United States Congress
In 1960, Bell was elected as a Republican to the Eighty-seventh Congress, and won re-election to the seven succeeding Congresses, serving from January 3, 1961 – January 3, 1977.
While in Congress, Bell represented a vast Congressional District — the 28th and, after re-districting, the 27th — running along the California coast from Malibu to the Palos Verdes Peninsula and encompassing all or part of Santa Monica, Pacific Palisades, Brentwood, Bel-Air and West L.A. Then considered a Republican stronghold, the district nevertheless had only 40% to 49% GOP voter registration, making bi-partisan support for a candidate for office essential.
In Congress, Bell became known as tending toward conservative positions on foreign policy and defense — he backed the Vietnam War through three presidential administrations — but often took more moderate to liberal positions on domestic issues, including open housing laws and other civil rights legislation, as well as on environmental and preservation issues, and on education policy and reform.
Some called Congressman Al Bell a political conservative, others a moderate. A Ralph Nader study on Bell's voting record in 1972 said: "It's hard to say exactly what he is. He leans in many areas, especially those concerning economic regulation, toward the conservatives. When it comes to the people issues, especially those concerning the downtrodden in American society, Bell is a liberal."
The congressman once described himself as "middle-ground" and said he voted according to principle and on an issue's merits, rather than political expediency. "A moderate", he told a Los Angeles Times columnist in 1970, "has to study harder. The extremist at either end doesn't have to do most of the work or most of the thinking – he knows what he's for and against beforehand. A moderate has to decide each question on its own merits."
As a ranking member of the House Committee on Science and Astronautics, and on the Committee on Education and Labor, he earned bi-partisan approval for his work on such diverse bills as the Older Americans Act, the Elementary and Secondary Education Act, the Housing and Urban Development Act of 1968, as well as laws improving labor standards, workers' safety, veterans' benefits and environmental protection and ecosystem and wildlife preservation programs. Bell also supported the Family Assistance Plan, the Comprehensive Child Development Act of 1971 and the Equal Rights Amendment.
Bell also supported every major piece of Civil Rights legislation considered in the Congress during his tenure, often working at odds with his own party, which frequently opposed these bills, and became a tireless advocate early on for the legislation which eventually became the Civil Rights Act of 1964. As the bill needed substantial bi-partisan support from Republicans to gain approval to counter-act the opposition of Democrats, Bell contributed significantly to passage of the Civil Rights Act in the House by helping to round up the necessary Republican votes. In this effort, he worked closely with and became close personal friends with Clarence Mitchell Jr., of the NAACP. He and Mitchell walked side by side during the 1963 March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom with Martin Luther King Jr., and both were honored by being seated behind the podium, in front of the Lincoln Memorial, as King delivered his famous "I Have a Dream" speech.
Writing later about passage of the historic 1964 legislation, Bell said: "I am proud to have supported the Civil Rights Act from the first. It was a bill that embraced the goal of equal opportunity for all people. A coalition of law-makers forged a consensus on the meaning of justice and equality in American life. This was a consensus based on the compelling principle of non-discrimination for all individuals, no matter what their race, religion ethnicity, or sex."
